Movement
by yohaidee
Summary: G1. Shaken by the loss of Skyfire, Starscream returns to Cybertron for help only to find that many things have changed during his leave.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** I do not own anything or anyone. Transformers are the property of Hasbro.

**A/N:** This is my first fanfiction, and English is not my first language (_meaning: be kind; and point out any terrible mistakes if you see them_).

I was never going to put this in writing, but inspiration had a gun pointed at my head.

So here it is – Starscream's descent into madness. No bright future prospects promised.

**Movement**

Chapter 1

He wished it was a technicolour nightmare. Nightmares did end.

His excruciating journey did not.

Starscream was terrified as never before in the millions of years of his existence. Lost, disoriented, desolate. Completely alone in the ever-expanding void of interstellar space.

He could not grasp for how long had he been flying in this direction – it could be breems or stellar cycles, or decades. Time had ceased to exist. He was but a ghost, a shadow going nowhere without direction, without guidance – without anything to hold on to.

Confined by eternal vastness.

Fuel reserves would run out… _soon_.

Silence was the most unnerving because it made his errant thoughts twice as loud. Clashing emotions swirled in his CPU fighting each other for dominance. _It was torture_. He tried looking past them in search for remains of confidence, but he found none. Hysteria was taking over, slowly and mercilessly.

How he wished his friend was there, chuckling good-humouredly at his pessimism, telling him everything was going to be all right. But he had left him there, on the accursed planet. Had he condemned him by trying to save him? Had he left too soon?

Starscream tried to picture Skyfire smiling assuredly, but everything his mind was able to come up was a broken and mangled shell, covered with a strange white substance. Lifeless optics accusing him of giving up the search too soon.

ooo

Starscream had wanted for the exploration mission to never end. He had been happy.

The tetrajet might have fashioned himself a lone mechanoid against the world, but in reality he would never admit to himself he yearned for acknowledgment. He needed to be spoken of, thought of… _dreamed_ _of_ – a constant reassurance he mattered.

Starscream was a black hole for attention, he took _everything_. Sadly, it was the same striving to become the epicentre of all, which made even kindred souls recoil in horror.

It had been so easy – travelling with Skyfire. There had been no-one to steal his spotlight, no-one _his_ Skyfire would talk to or think of. Skyfire had listened to everything he rejoiced at, ranted about or sulked over, and Starscream had been grateful. He had been content and self-confident, revelling in the long sought after approval; thoughts so surprisingly calm and crystal clear. Had it been his friend's generous patience and kindness that tamed his quick temper?

There had been only one thing to be afraid of, making his processors glitch from worry, the moment he would have to return to Cybertron.

He had tried to fool himself, to pretend there was no going back home – all in vain. Skyfire had friends there, ones he was so ineffably jealous of. He would go – _leave_ – as everybody did, and then they would be reduced to the mute figures nodding to each other when passing by on a crowded street. Phantoms of the past, reminders of what once had been – he had seen too many of the kind.

The very thought of going back to the normal, simple and predictable life on Cybertron repulsed him. He hated the rules society lived by with an ardent passion. For it was nothing more than a mind-numbing routine, much like a visual track on a loop. Nights at an energon bar, holidays spent on trips to the nearest friendly exoplanet to 'relax and see some amusing alien wildlife' – everything to forget the unnerving reality which was work. Or, as leaders of the High Council had once put _oh-so-eloquently_, the great machine of advancement.

What disturbed Starscream most was the fact that nobody seemed to notice the obvious absurdity of such existence. Slaves to the credits did not dare to raise optics and look outside the box. They knew no different.

But he was not one of them. He had always felt he was destined for something greater.

ooo

Life had a cruel sense of irony indeed.

He was now heading to the planet he had thought would take Skyfire from him, the very sphere he had been so reluctant to return to.

The breakneck speed at which his exostructure was cutting through clouds of interstellar grains did not seem fast enough anymore. Assorted warnings flashed threateningly in front of Starscream's visual receptors: low energy levels, damaged sensors, system malfunction. Little by little his neural nets were being overwhelmed by the sheer fear of deactivating. It was not something natural for beings blessed with a supposedly eternal life. Everything faltered in front of the terrifying prospect of the ultimate end.

Starscream searched the never-ending blackness desperately for anything recognisable, but all stars looked foreign, as if mocking him. Sensory nodes on his wings still screamed from the recent brush with a flock of space rocks, but he did not dare to numb the throbbing pain. It was keeping his thoughts clear, and he needed it. Focus.

Affected by self-repair systems, the pain was already starting to subside, when Starscream's visual receptors registered the little yellow speck of a dying star, uncannily dim among its sisters - the ghostly centre of Cybertron's solar system. He thought it but a mirage, a hallucination spawned by his failing processor, but the image was genuine, almost indecently real. A decaying body of collapsing elements was stretching its spectral fingers towards him.

He felt relief seeping through the grooves of anxiety, filling his spark with warm gratefulness, as system, now firmly locked on the coordinates of Cybertron, confirmed the worryingly low levels of fuel would be just enough for covering the remaining distance and landing. At the moment his processor did not register anything beyond the familiar safe comfort home planet offered. Everything he had racked his neural circuits about whilst on the mission and during the lonely way back seemed to have lost all significance. Politics, ideals, even fear for Skyfire's well-being – nothing mattered when compared to an end in the threatening void of the cold interstellar space.

And then his visual sensors acknowledged it at last, the tiny metallic sphere that was Cybertron mirroring the ghostly shine of its sun. A diode blackened by soot, a reflection of the world built on millions of years of striving for industrial perfection. Smothered, pillaged for energy, long doomed by unattainable goals - for a sentient mechanical being it was home still.

Starscream felt all self-doubt fade until it was nothing more than a footnote in one of the folders locked away at remote sector of his memory banks. For the first time he was sure Skyfire would be all right. He could have fallen into stasis lock from a lack of energy, he could be covered by layers of the crystalline substance, circuits damaged by its tendency to expand when going into frozen state, but all right nevertheless. Their species wasn't of the kind that was terminated easily, and Starscream had never known anybody to end life in this unnatural way. Although the knowledge of such possibility existed as a part of his basic programming, he was still young and unpolluted by disillusionment tormenting those who had seen hundreds of centuries pass before their optics.

To himself he had proven to be the greatest of flyers yet again - returned as a hero, found the right way back through an uncharted territory of space with nothing but his optical receptors, won at impossible odds!

_Oh, h__e was the best_.

Nonetheless, he couldn't gloat over his strength and brilliance just yet, because entering Cybertron's atmosphere, however thin, and landing without ending up as scrap metal presented new problems and new, possibly sad, scenarios. Then again, he could calculate the necessary angles and trajectories even at less than a half of his processing speed. It was easy, as everything visualised in front of his optic sensors - all probabilities considered, all potential plans of action devised, simulations run, checked, and run again. After all, there _was_ a great scientific mind safely hidden behind the deceptive veil of flamboyance.

The Cybertron's northern hemisphere bent in a great arc beneath his small form, skyscrapers glistening dangerously like energon needles in the sun. He could already tell the whereabouts of Iacon, the mapping grid locking on the tell-tale coordinates of the place he had spent many stellar cycles of his life at. The Iacon Institute of Science and Technology – they had left it together, he and Skyfire, to explore nine exoplanets as the basis for their final major project in xenoplanetary geography and biology. It seemed to have been only breems ago, as they had watched home shrinking to a little dot in the distance, both eager in anticipation to see the wonders of planets yet to be officially registered, yet to have a mark in the great chart database of outer space.

The last night on Cybertron was etched in his memory banks forever, now almost too clear for his liking. The hopes had been sky-high, the conversations had been flowing freely, as had the high-grade. He had never been able to stand the eternal babbling of Skyfire's friends, but at the time, with a little help from the particularly strong energon and the fact that many questions and half of the praise was addressed to him, Starscream had been uncharacteristically polite, kind even. He hadn't sent anybody to check for a possible loss of half a motherboard, he hadn't snapped about not being backwards-compatible when somebody couldn't grasp his explanations, full of science slang as they were. That had gone so well with Skyfire. He had looked as if he was thanking Primus for reformatting tetrajet's neural nets, even if for only one night.

Starscream snorted at the memory, he never wished to see the bunch of dolts again. Only Skyfire could enjoy the company of such undereducated factory drones, unable to talk science or politics, or, as the case seemed to be, anything remotely intellectual. What did his friend see in these mindless gears anyway? He would never lower himself to such level, that's for sure. Closing the memory file and leaving the annoying contradictions of Skyfire to be reflected on later, he concentrated on the present situation once again.

He was quite certain of the way things would happen once back on Cybertron. He would return to the institute and tell them where and how the accident had happened, and they, in turn, would immediately put together a deep space rescue team. As it was somebody's life that was in danger, the team would, no doubt, be given one of the ships with an in-built space-shift acceleration drive, used only for special missions. He had seen one of them at work on a video wave transmission channel once, and was sure it would take the rescue team to the alien planet in no time. Skyfire, that big oaf of a shuttle, would be back and operating, and annoying as usual. Oh, and he surely wouldn't miss a chance to point out the dubious functionality of his white friend's weather simulations programme, just to make things nicely habitual again.

Starscream let his thoughts wander for a moment, now regained all the confidence the impromptu space trip had taken from him. He could already see the headlines: "Courageous scientist saves a team-mate", "You just have to do it for a friend – says the young hero", "Starscream, the fastest jet in the universe"…

His once-enemies would blow gaskets in envy.

With a particularly amusing mental image on his CPU, Starscream took a sharp dive towards the surface of the planet. Everything was going as planned – his turbo engines whined from the boost, his frame heated up, and vents jumped to life with a loud whirr to compensate for the rising temperature. Global positioning grid switched on, and the names of cities and highways spread out before his visual receptors. The marked place of Iacon was just few degrees to the left, but he could not alter the trajectory once the angle had been taken. Leaving all paint coating in the upper levels of atmosphere would not be a fitting arrival for 'the fastest jet in the universe'.

_Oh well_, Starscream thought, _precision doesn't really matter _that_ much. _However, he couldn't quite suppress some annoyance at the fact he had made a mistake.

_Wherever I land, I'll be able to get a shuttle to Iacon anyway_, he tried to convince himself it had been the idea all along. _They might be even waiting for me, I'm sure they have been informed_, he imagined a crowd watching his touchdown, cheering. _Yes, they are… oh… what the…_

"Slag!" the tetrajet cried out, as he first heard a click, then a strange hum rising in volume, followed by an audios-piercing spatter, as his right booster gave out, the lost balance propelling him out of the angle and pushing downwards steeply. He was too shocked and surprised to react, whilst warnings of overheating, angle miscalculation, gyro malfunction and prognosis of imminent termination ringed in his audio receivers in a distorted, simultaneous clash. Having registered the overwhelming heat, the touch nodes under the armour plating were automatically shutting down one by one to save him the agony of a sensory overload.

Starscream fell faster and faster, the friction fire spreading from the nosecone to the tips of his wings, grazing at the polish and paintjob, threatening to melt the alloyed plating underneath. The jumble of buildings down beneath seemed to be rushing towards to greet him like a long lost friend, but he was not eager to meet the crushing embrace just yet. He had to find a way out, there was always a way out.

_Think, think, think_. Starscream tried to focus, whilst attempting to fight off the suddenly overwhelming weariness that made everything a blur. He was in a freefall, all systems destabilised by the heat, electrolytic liquid from cracked capacitors leaking in his systems, short-circuiting the vital connections. It could be only a matter of astroseconds until it got to his core processor, stopping all functions and forcing an involuntary stasis lock. He would not feel the devastating impact destroying his exostructure and distinguishing his spark as he hit the ground.

ooo

The falling form of the tetrajet, like a torch thrown into abyss, reflected in pink, naive optics of a sparkling standing on a passageway joining upper levels of two skyscrapers.

"Look, creator, a shooting star!" the sparkling squeaked with excitement, tugging on an older mech's wrist to get his attention, the other hand stretched towards the yellow sky, pointing at the glittering dot, now not so far from the spires of the higher buildings.

"Stars do not…" the creator started explaining in a surly tone, speaking volumes of how tired he was, but still raised optics to look at the sector of sky his offspring was pointing at.

"Oh… that," was all he was able to utter once the realisation struck him. "Don't look at it!" the mech hastily added, turning around to shield the sparkling from the sight of one's termination. "It will make your optics glitch."

"But it's _pre-eee-ty_" the sparkling whined in a pleading tone, visibly offended.

"I said 'no', and that's the end of it," the old mech scolded, pulling the sparkling towards the end of the passageway and to an entrance in the building, his processor at unease over the grim fate of the 'shooting star' he had just seen.

ooo

_To be continued…_


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Ahh, first reviewers! /_beams_/ I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Chapter 2

Starscream felt firm ground beneath his wings, discovering he lay on his back in robot mode. He was confused for an astrosecond, his neural nets not cooperating, but then a realisation struck. It had been just a dream after all! A nonsensical apparition caused by his central processor switching to recharge mode. In moments like these he really hated the unnecessary program. After all, it was completely pointless and only disturbed the energy replenishment.

His exostructure plating was nicely warm. Obviously he had been so tired of following Skyfire on his never ending quest to see one or another rock formation that he had fallen asleep somewhere in the open, under the direct rays of planetary system's star. Starscream grimaced imagining the amount of dirt he would find in his joints after the improvised nap and the time it would take to clean it out. Skyfire was such a _friend_. Why hadn't he woken him up? Was it because he wanted to humour him and his grinding servos later?

"Ahh, slagger…" Starscream murmured to himself in a mildly annoyed tone. Actually he didn't care much at the moment. The heat waves on his chassis felt so nice, and he was so incredibly exhausted all of a sudden. He couldn't even be bothered to switch the optical or the audio receptors back on. The black, warm silence was so much better than the barren, rocky landscape and the howling wind throwing washes of sand against his armour plating.

The jet was already drifting back into recharge mode, as he felt something light hitting his left arm, then pulling it aside.

"Skyfire, stop it!" he growled. "It's not funny at all, whatever it is…" his voice trailed off as the tiredness and need for recharge took over.

_Silence._

"Oh, right…'' Starscream drawled after a brief moment of waiting for a reply, voice low. "Audio and visual sensors: on."

His optics flickered and then a distorted and pixelated silhouette of a mech leaning over him came into the view. Starscream couldn't distinguish the mech's face – it was but a black shadow in front of a light slice of sky. For an unknown reason, he sensed uneasiness taking over his spark, making it pulse against its casing errantly. His audios were full of the never-changing hiss of static, but, as astroseconds dragged on, he started to hear rippling sounds in the background. They sounded familiar to the jet, reminding an expedition to a region covered by a mass of see-through, liquid substance that made such noises when moved by wind. Same sounds, same planet, but why did the mech's face in front of him seem so strange?

"Sky?... Skyfire?" he questioned the silhouette. "Where am I?" He winced at the sound of his own voice. Although he had never had the most melodious of voices, now it sounded garbled and grating beyond recognition. What had happened to all of his systems, why was he damaged?

"_He-ee-y_, prettyface," the dark mech responded cheerily, "welcome back to the operating!''

''Now that was one bad fall, wasn't it?" he inquired, voice strong and optimistic. The broad-shouldered green groundling lowered his face to stare right into Starscream's puzzled and unfocused optics. He was so proud of his basic medical training that had helped bringing the unfortunate flyer back from stasis.

"_Where_ am I?" Starscream repeated, tone twice as shrill in panic, as the reality finally dawned on him. Hazy and vague with glitched images and missing parts, the recordings of just few breems ago replayed on his central processor.

He could recall switching off the functioning left thruster to buy few precious hundredths of an astrosecond against the pull of gravity. His structure had slowed down just enough to allow transforming, yet his logic circuits still deemed the idea insane. There was a brief black-out, and then, when his optic receptors reset themselves, all he could see was walls of multi-storey buildings running by in smudgy lines, enclosing him. Starscream didn't think anymore, he acted on impulse and hoped for the best. A square, flat area among the roots of the sky-high towers was already dangerously close, as he went into transformation sequence, stretching his left leg downwards and reigniting the booster. It must have coincided with the instant the electrolyte hit his mainframe, as there was no memory of what had happened next.

"Shh," the other mech answered, putting a finger in front of his mouth as an emphasis and completely ignoring jet's question. "Save the fuel, there's not much left." He gestured to the left as if to explain what he was worried about.

Starscream's sensors had been slowly readjusting themselves to their normal settings, and once the visuals became clear he noticed the skyscrapers he had seen whilst falling, blocking almost all of the yellow sunlight, except for a little stretch of sky right above the square. He also saw a layer of air move quite peculiarly over the surface of his structure, bending the image in the background. He had taken the paint-melting heat for warm rays of a foreign sun. An odd bitterness wormed its way to his spark.

The sounds of waves also explained themselves, as his audios picked up the dull clamour of a crowd. Many bots of different shapes, sizes and colour schemes were stood around the place of the accident in a sloppy circle, chattering amongst themselves happily. Starscream frowned and looked back to the green mech, who still had his gaze locked on some spot at the jet's side.

"_What_ do you think you are doing?" He used the right elbow to prop himself halfway up and take a suspicious glance at the left arm, panels of which had been removed to accommodate six tiny tubes of shimmering purple liquid, connected to a small container sitting at his side, now almost empty.

The groundling shook his head sadly, unable to believe he was being mistrusted.

"Saving you from an overall energy drain," he explained timidly. "I believed you would want to be functional before the medics arrive."

"I do not require any medical attention," Starscream cut the mech's explanations, now sitting up and twiddling with the energon tubes, trying to unplug them. "As you may have noted, I did not crash, therefore I _am not_ damaged." He growled when one of the tubes didn't give in to his shaking fingers. He hated feeling so vulnerable and detested the idea of being made indebted to someone whilst unconscious. Even if that someone had been correct about the energy levels, he still did not have the right to play a hero and demand gratitude.

"Now then," having pulled out the last of tubes with much more force than necessary, Starscream returned his attention to the first row of the noisy crowd, "can anyone tell me the designated name of this place, or is it too much to ask for?"

"Please calm down," the green mech interrupted. "The medics should be here in a breem, and you are still very low on energy. Shouting will not help in any way." He put his arms on jet's shoulder plating, trying to push him back down gently. He certainly didn't expect the injured flyer to react the way he did.

"Get off me!" Starscream cried, shoving the groundling with such vigour that he lost balance and landed on his aft. The jet used the short moment of confusion to get up on his feet, trying to look imposing, but failing miserably. The portion of energon had helped to get most of his systems back on-line, but he still felt weak, trembling visibly. His mind - disoriented and perplexed, at a complete loss over what to do next.

He could wait for the medics, but then he would not reach the Institute in time. They would not let him go until he was fully repaired, and they would need explanations. Explanations took time. The jet was not sure if he was going to stay online for long in this state, but he knew there was not a single astrosecond to be wasted at the cost of Skyfire's life.

Having arrived at a resolution, Starscream fixed his gaze on one of the bots in the crowd standing close to him.

"I believe you can tell me the name of this place," he asked wearily, pleadingly. The mech turned away to look at the ground, not daring to argue with the evidently delusional flyer.

"The name," jet repeated, staring at the rows of onlookers, ''please?''

"Hexataar." He heard a muffled answer coming from the back of the crowd. Many turned their heads to give the source of the reply a disapproving glance.

"Hexataar," Starscream affirmed to himself absent-mindedly, still testing the strength of his legs. "And the central shuttle station – which way?"

Half a dozen arms stretched out to point in the same direction, as loud murmur erupted in the middle of the crowd. A part of them was of the opinion that the jet's neural nets had short-circuited during the fall, thus making him a hazard to himself and others. They insisted on capturing the flier and holding him down until the medics arrive and take care of him. The other half of the crowd, however, thought letting him go would be a better idea, because only Primus knows what he would do if anybody tried to stop him by force.

"Thank you, thank you," Starscream repeated quietly as the crowd separated to let him pass through, words strange and foreign to his vocaliser. He saw them looking at his dented wings, scratched chassis and peeling paint with a silent pity, and realised how bad his structure must look for complete strangers to do so. This was something new. He had never been felt sorry for before, but it was so surprisingly close to being cared for. Starscream almost liked it… _almost_.

Only when the sleek winged figure had disappeared between the buildings and into the bustle of busy streets, did the crowd start to disperse. Still taken up with analysing the event they had just become part of, bots were leaving to return to their safe and predictable everyday routines. Some of them, however, were going to find it hard to forget a certain red and white flyer, spending time trying to make sense of the situation. They had seen arrogance, no doubt, but they had also seen spark-tearing despair. What had happened to the mech before he fell? If only they had had the struts to step out of the flock and offer help…

ooo

Starscream slowly staggered in the direction where he hoped to find the shuttle station. The flying was out of question now. Even if both turbines were functional, he wouldn't have the courage to test if the fuel would or wouldn't run out before reaching Iacon.

The jet stopped from time to time to take a look for any signs showing the way to station, but there weren't any. Of course, in a small town everybody was expected to know everything. Irritated, he still didn't consider the idea of asking someone, especially after he had noticed the distance many passers-by were keeping as if trying to avoid him at all costs.

_This is ridiculous_, he thought. _Sure, I'm not the best looking mechanoid at the moment, but they seem to be frightened rather than repulsed by my appearance. Maybe my model has been discovered to have a dangerous malfunction or something. I'll have to find out after I get Skyfire back._

To test the theory, he turned to a yellow femme coming towards him and raised one hand to stop her. Theory passed the practical test as femme shrunk back and let out a high-pitched cry. Stepping back until she was against a wall of a building, she weakly raised hands as if to shield her head from a blow, optics wide in fear. Starscream backed off a little, curious to see how she would react, and the femme used the moment to turn and rush away with a speed that made her structure a bright streak against the grey metal of the street.

The clang of her frantic steps had already faded when Starscream glanced around and found the walkway empty. In a split astrosecond everybody seemed to have disappeared around the corners of side-streets. He might have found it unnerving before the ill-fated expedition, but right now he really needed something – _anything_ - to lighten the mood.

"_Ha!_" the jet smirked with glee. This was weird, but fun nonetheless.

He had no idea of how things had changed on Cybertron during the time he and Skyfire had spent happily travelling from one planet to another. He was oblivious of the energon crisis, the decline of industries, the machinations carried out by senators of the High Council to insure their companies seized monopoly over their respective markets whilst situation was unstable. He hadn't heard of the sky-rocketing crime rate and the notorious gangs of Kaon, who, as the news said, knew at least twenty ways of distinguishing one's spark.

Created and raised in peaceful times, the jet couldn't have imagined he had been taken for a criminal, but that was exactly what they saw when looking at the scorch marks on his chassis. Those were one of the tell-tale symbols speaking of dubious places, dark deeds, illegal weapons, black market, robbery and murder. No city was safe anymore - crime had spread like a disease, taking old and young, strong and weak, and rich and poor in its ever-welcoming embrace.

Starscream didn't try to scare anybody else on his way to the station, one shrieking femme was enough entertainment for the day. He also knew he shouldn't attract attention because medics and police would be for looking him after being informed of the fall and his reluctance to be repaired. They would hunt him like an unstable, malfunctioning drone, therefore he had to be careful, _very careful_, until he reached the Institute.

ooo

Meanwhile in the Head of the Iacon Institute's office a great change was taking place.

The new director was leaning back in his chair, scrutinising the cracks running along the ceiling. _How pathetic to have one's office in such a state, whilst shuffling all money into student holiday trips. The room has to be re-decorated… urgently!_

He let out an annoyed sigh, and stretched an arm before his optics to check if all finger joints were perfectly clean.

_Yet_, the director smiled to himself, _for once I possess a tap on the great pipe of education budget. I always knew this day would come._ His thoughts wandered on and on. A new apartment in a better area, servants instead of maintenance drones… Maybe an exostructure upgrade? He had never enjoyed being short.

The daydream was interrupted by a knock on the door, which then slid aside to reveal an imposing black and silver mech with emotionless yellow optics. _Ahh, the secretary – punctual as always._

"Sir, have you come up with the official announcement yet?" the black mech asked slowly and quietly, like weighing the meaning of every word.

''Yes.'' The director sat up straight in his chair to look professional. "Firstly, we focus on the damage professor Stormbolt has done by misappropriating the funds. Then we explain the reason why all course programmes have to undergo a revision." There was a glint of hungry greed in his optics as he imagined where the credits, saved on cutting the course expenses, would go.

"Of course, nobody likes to hear the old drill about energon rationing over and over again, hence we will put the main emphasis on the positive prospects of exploring the world within every-bot's reach." A wide grin stretched over his faceplates. He was a genius!

"Why should we waste energy on long distance missions, which never succeed in finding anything to help alleviating the energon crisis?" the director swung his arm animatedly to emphasize the thought, looking as if he was delivering a speech in front of a hundred-strong audience.

''Moreover, the reason why they go, the possibility of another race of sentient beings existing on one of those Primus-forsaken exoplanets is laughable to say the least. The general public does not like such pointless goals wasting their precious tax money. They will be on our side,'' he finished, leaning forward and crossing his fingers on the tabletop contentedly.

''I see,'' the secretary nodded approvingly. ''However, sir, I must remind you there are five exploration teams that haven't returned yet. What are your suggestions for the general actions to be taken when they arrive?" The mech produced a datapad and stylus to take notes. He always did it. Precision was important.

"Simple," the director answered, smirking a little. The secretary was so unbelievably predictable. „Tell them Stormbolt was acting without the approval of the City Council, completely ignoring the guidelines of how allocated resources should be put to use.'' His optics dimmed for a moment. He knew how to put them to use with _much better _results.

''The programme itself was a failure on the Ministry of Education's part. It should have never been accepted in the first place, since the new rules of energon rationing were already being reviewed at the time.'' He was a smart mech, who knew his contacts well.

"I see." The secretary sounded impressed, even with his slow manner of speaking. "I would think the exactness of this information has been affirmed by the source, yes?" He raised his optics from the datapad to take a brief glance at his superior's face.

"Yes." The director felt his good mood being dissipated by the blank, calculated gaze of the apathetic optics. "Try to explain peacefully that the inappropriate course programmes have now been deleted and are no longer carried out, for the Council has been keeping a watchful optic on us ever since the incident with Stormbolt. You should also mention we're not running budget courses anymore, as we can't afford it given the decrease in funding," he told the mech taking notes, the expression on his face becoming one of a mocked sadness.

''As for the final level students,'' he continued with even more self-satisfaction, ''for whom the exploration trip was a part of their project, offer to return to the Institute the next stellar cycle, when their chosen programme has been revised and updated.'' The director slumped back in his chair, no longer concerned about keeping up the image. All of the secretary's attention was on the datapad anyway.

"Be careful, though, to mention the fact that they will have to pay to finish the course. Better leave it for a later date, when they have taken in the rest of the news,'' he added almost as an afterthought.

"I see," the secretary answered, ''you do not wish to deal with problems in a direct manner, sir.''

The director pondered for a brief moment if it was an observation rather than sly sarcasm coming from the black mech's vocaliser, but gave up and said the first thing that came to his mind.

"The direct manner never works."

ooo

_To be continued…_


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** Just to make the Cybertronian time units clear (as I'm starting to use them a lot): astrosecond: 1 sec (I'm ignoring wikipedia in this case); breem: 8.3 min; joor: 1 hour; stellar cycle: 1 year; vorn: 83 years.

Now on with the story!

Chapter 3

The shuttle station was very busy at this time of day. One could hardly hear his own thoughts over the chatter of mechs waiting for their transport. The combined clatter of feet, wheels, tracks and other kinds of extremities, which provided diverse mechanoid models with the ability to move, ringed deafeningly loud under the white overhang of station building's roof. Time by time tell-tale clicks and whirrs were heard, as the giant, heavy-built shuttle bots transformed to their alternate mode to let the passengers on board, or back – to have a well-deserved break.

Starscream had been looking at a large, grey flier leaning against a wall lackadaisically near a sign, which said 'Iacon', for what felt like four breems now. The shuttle appeared to be happy, swirling purple energon in a huge cube in his hand, optics dimmed dreamily. It meant luck was on the jet's side again.

_This will be easy_, Starscream thought, _just look miserable, look miserable…_

He knew very well the calm and meek spirit of Skyfire, and in general for similar models the basic programming was supposed to be the same. He knew very well which buttons to push, and which better leave untouched.

Still, there was an unfathomable chasm of difference between his white friend and his dark look-alike. The work of transport bots was one of the hardest and lowest-paid, no self respecting mech would ever stoop so low if given a choice in the matter, and the shuttle he was observing quietly had certainly seen better days. Once beautifully ashen grey with green accents, now his exostructure plating was a pitiful sight of tear and wear, a vociferous witness of poverty.

Starscream made the most innocent face he was capable of – optics wide and lips slightly parted in a silent plea for help – and stepped closer to the shuttle. He stood there unnoticed by the mech for few astroseconds, considering the best way to approach him, but then a sudden sharp question cut off his contemplation.

"_What?!_" the huge grey mech snapped, narrowing his optics suspiciously. The weird jet had been staring at him for long enough to test the limits of his patience. His working shift had just started, and it seemed it was going to be just as bland and tiring as yesterday's. On top of it all now this annoying little glitch wouldn't stop gaping at him as if his spark casing was exposed.

Starscream hesitated for a moment, scowling. Now that it had come to this, he truly _hated_ begging. There wasn't anything that could hurt his pride more than being at a mercy of a transport bot. It only took one look at the shuttle's scratched paint-job and rust-speckled chassis to tell he hadn't had an overhaul in vorns. The tetrajet felt sick, and even his analytic sub-programs weren't able to tell if it was from the low-grade, impure energon, which had been pumped into his systems just a joor ago, or because of what he was about to do.

He reset his vocaliser, took a ventful of air and asked the only question, which could pass as a fitting start for a conversation: "Are you going to Iacon?"

The bulky flier muttered affirmation and nodded towards the sign on the wall he was leaning against. Still disinterested, he turned his gaze over the crowding passengers before dimming optics once again.

_Smooth, Starscream_, the jet mentally scolded himself. Since when had he lost his touch so badly?

The shuttle crossed his arms, eying the midday sky, a narrow line of venomous yellow between the roof overhang above and buildings in the distance, with distrust. Were there acid clouds at the horizon? Would he have to suffer hours of heavy rain eating away at his finish again?

"Hnn…" the jet interrupted his musings with a strange sound, which cut abruptly like a question choking on itself.

The shuttle didn't take it kindly to say the least. _How dared he have the insolence to invade the serenity of his private space again!_ _How dared he ruin_ _the only moment of tranquillity he could have before the long, exhausting shift! How dared he!_

"Well?" The big mech turned to Starscream, his voice full of irritation.

The words got stuck in jet's voicebox, but he still managed to spit them out.

"Will you take me to Iacon?" Starscream asked warily, trying to twist his faceplates in a small, spark-melting smile. It had to work just as it always did with Skyfire.

The shuttle raised an optic ridge incredulously, and wanted to point at the destination sign again before a quaint idea crossed his mind.

"Do you have eighty credits or a valid shuttle pass?" he enquired in a well-memorised, bored monotone. The mech was surprised to see the jet flinch. Maybe this day wouldn't be so bad after all. He could have some fun for a change. As it looked like the little hoodlum couldn't fly anymore - _how sad -_ seeing him beg would be irresistibly entertaining, especially with police already on his tracks.

"I… umm… well… actually…" Starscream rummaged his databanks for a solution, but couldn't come up with any options other than telling the truth.

"_Ye-ee-s_?" the grey mech drawled derisively. The fragging smart-aft light aerials, they always acted like they were better than other bots. Now was the time he would get his revenge.

"How can I possibly have any credits on me when I've just arrived from a run across half the universe?!" Starscream replied with vigour, his voice rising three pitches.

The shuttle smirked. It couldn't be a good sign. He had to save what was salvageable and quick.

"I am a student at Iacon Institute of Science and Technology. I lost my friend on a far exoplanted due to a localised weather anomaly, and now I must return to the Institute as soon as possible to save him," the jet continued, searching the giant's facial components for a response. He wished to see something changing in shuttle's expression, but there was nothing resembling understanding or compassion, only a shadow of amusement and a frightening glint in the optic panels.

"My friend," he started again, voice hideously squeaky from strain, "is a shuttle too. Not a transport though," he added and instantly regretted saying the last part out loud. No-one should ever try to remind a transport bot of his position.

"_Su-uu-re_ he is," the grey mech replied, a low, rumble-like chuckle resonating deep in his intake systems.

Of course, why would he believe the jet's unimaginable story? Still, Starscream's logic chips weren't known for the ability to override his emotional programming, which always refused to accept defeat.

"Excuse me," the shuttle grinned and turned away to head to the end of his docking platform, where many bots were already waiting for him, "I have to be on schedule." He felt so good leaving the screechy little thug behind.

The tetrajet watched as rust stains on the grimy grey back retreated in the distance, and an overwhelming frustration over all the injustices of the world welled up in his vocaliser.

"Why – does – nobody – ever – help?!" He punched the white station wall with a force that made his knuckle joints creak in protest.

The transport bot stopped in his tracks, startled by the high-pitched, grating yell. He had a good spark, but even such sparks yearned retaliation sometimes.

"Maybe it's because of that laser-scorched paint-job of yours," he answered sarcastically, turning to look at the jet once more.

Starscream froze, the expression on his face becoming one of a genuine puzzlement, which was quickly replaced by an ugly sneer.

"How _funny_ of you to say that when the extent of damage on your finish is obviously only mirrored by your malfunctioning CPU," the red and white flier scoffed. He was done with the pleasantries here. "Are you really _that_ obsolete to think I would deliberately destroy my armour plating to beg for alms?" He straightened up to look more imposing, cobalt fists clenched tight.

The comeback taking form on the shuttle's mind was cut short by an uncanny sinking feeling. What if the small mech had been telling the truth? If not, judging by this remark, he had to be the most convincing liar the transport bot had ever seen. Yet it was strange even for someone that clever to put laser gunfire and begging together, knowing no wise bot would ever help a criminal.

The grey mech stroked his chin thoughtfully and looked straight into Starscream's smouldering optics. The jet returned glare, stepping back and raising fists in defence, as if expecting him to start a fight. Some passers-by slowed down, curious of the quarrel, whilst others rushed past without looking back because they already knew what to expect when gang members were involved.

The shuttle raised a hand as a sign of peace and closed the distance between them.

"I might have misunderstood you," he said calmly, glancing at Starscream's quivering wings, which spoke volumes of his low energy levels. "If I may ask, for how long did you travel the space before returning to Cybertron?"

"Thirty six stellar cycles," the young mech answered without any twists, too surprised of the unexpected turn things were taking. He was almost certain the giant was just mocking him in a new cruel way, but he didn't care much anymore. He had to come up with a better story for the next transport shuttle, one that would make even the most hardened mech sob in pity. Unfortunately, his mainframe was refusing to co-operate, only dragging up old images of Skyfire smiling at him, Skyfire tinkering with one or another invention… Skyfire, Skyfire, Skyfire.

"Is there a problem?" a black and white groundling enquired, stepping next to the shuttle. Starscream almost jumped when he noticed the police symbol on the mech's chest. He wished for the ground to open and hide him, but the only thing he could do was put a mask of indifference over his facial features, at which he didn't exactly succeed.

"No, no problems here, officer! This young sir is worried about the well-being of his creator, who got shot in Iacon last night, and I'm merely trying to calm him down," the grey mech responded so smoothly that Starscream felt a small sting of jealousy over the fascinating skill. Still, he was surprised when police bot took 'being shot' for a believable explanation and left.

Since when did anybody get shot? Shot by what? Was it a new designation for doing something that could put one's health in danger? He decided to find out later, after the mysterious actions of the transport mech were accounted for.

"You're welcome," the shuttle flashed an amused grin, as Starscream stopped looking at the retreating figure of the officer and returned gaze back to his face. "Now answer just one more question, and you're coming with me."

"Is that a trick or what?" the jet enquired, still not believing the sudden change in big mech's behaviour.

The grey bot shook his head, and continued. "What is your opinion on rationing?" he asked in a serious tone.

"Rationing? _Ha_, they talk about it all the time, the environmentalists, but they will never pull it off in real life. That's all theory, nothing more. Can you really imagine the Council cutting the budget and increasing tax on everything just to save some energon, which we still have enough of anyway?" He could have ranted on and on, but the thriving of a spectacular monologue was stopped by the shuttle placing a heavy hand on his left shoulder vent.

"Thank you," he nodded, surprised by the dislike jet showed, squirming to get away from the touch. "You just answered my question, and now it's time to go. See, everybody's waiting for me." The shuttle motioned towards the platform that stretched out of the shadow of station's roof and into the bright, yellow light of noon sun. A long queue of travellers of various shapes and sizes winded among pillars supporting the roof, the exostructures of the first few shining in sunlight as if on fire.

Starscream heard a quiet click as the transport bot unsubspaced a half-empty energon cube and pushed it in his hand almost forcefully. He looked at him questioningly, refusing to accept it, but the expression on shuttle's faceplates didn't leave any room for protests.

"You know you need it," the grey mech hissed, voice low. Starscream grimaced. Drinking from the same cube the lowly transport had held to his mouth previously wasn't his idea of energizing. Sadly, the shuttle was right – he needed it. His systems were running slower by astrosecond, and it left him with no choice. Starscream sighed and nodded obediently, following the large flier on his way towards the docking ramp, clutching the cube like it was the most precious gift he had ever received.

In a breem he was inside the transport bot's alternate mode, sipping the life-giving purple liquid slowly and listening to the noise of turbines increasing power and the rhythmic beat of a fuel pump, echoing behind the thin plating that hid the mech's internal systems. He felt the shuttle gain altitude, rising above the highest buildings to fly over the inner city traffic routes, and then everything faded to grey as energy saving mode took over his processors.

ooo

In a darkened room several floors under the ground level an intimidating figure was standing in front of a wide video screen, the soft blue glow falling on sharp angles of silver armour, casting eerie reflections over a table covered in control surfaces, shelves full of datapads, and a rack holding an impressive collection of various weapons. The air was stale, and the walls that faded out of light's reach seemed to be closing in on their captive with an excruciating slowness. A suffocating mix of anger and hate had spread its numerous tentacles in the dark, hanging heavy over the prisoner's head.

He was waiting, every joint and connection strained to the point of snapping.

The blue screen flickered faintly before an image of a purple transformer came up, and the processing unit of the communication device whirred to life to keep up the connection. The silver mech stepped closer to the screen, almost touching it, to look at the other closely.

"Megatron?" a single yellow optic flickered nervously. "I… I have no time right now."

"Shockwave, my friend," the mech spoke, ignoring what the other had just said, "when are you going to come to your senses and stand up for our cause?" He stared hard at the purple mech in the vidscreen, but the lack of facial features hid any expression of fear the opponent might have felt.

"As I have told you before, Megatron," the official answered too familiarly for his liking, "I believe in your ideals, but this is not the right time to take action."

"Or perhaps you're just too cowardly to admit you fear to lose your cushy job at the Council?" the silver mech sneered, optics narrowing in disgust.

Shockwave's optic flashed brightly at the question, but he didn't hesitate to counter it. Beggars were not choosers, yet Megatron seemed to have a difficulty understanding the simple concept.

"You should be aware you have no power in the Council anymore, my lord, or have you forgotten?" The purple mech twitched, seeing the ruby optics on screen blazing an enraged bright red. The silver warrior in front of him grabbed a corner of communications console and dug his digits so deep that sparks started to fly from the gashes, illuminating corners of the room in the background.

The image on screen distorted, and Shockwave stepped back hastily, as if it were in Megatron's powers to teleport through the device.

"The time is now, Shockwave," the mech's raspy voice cut through the feedback of the signal device going haywire, full of static and terrifying. "If you are not with me, you're against me. And you will wish you had made a different choice when I'll extinguish your treacherous spark with my bare hands."

"Lord Megatron," now there was the fear, the submission he desired to hear, "I fully support your ideas, as do other members of the Council, but proletarians are imbecilic and cowardly. They will do whatever the senators and Sentinel Prime tell them to."

Megatron's optic panels dimmed slightly. He was thinking.

"You have strong supporters amongst the high ranking and the educated, but we have to devise a plan for gaining a following of the general public," Shockwave continued, still afraid to be misunderstood.

"Very well," the purple bot heard a surprisingly calm answer over the still active audio link, "what are your suggestions in order to achieve this goal?"

Shockwave wavered for a moment, trying to put all the scattered thoughts running astray in his processor in one clear sentence to hold the essence of his idea.

"You need an ideal," he replied, yet unsure of his own words.

"An _ideal_?" Megatron enquired mockingly. "Really, Shockwave, the uselessness of your mainframe amazes me."

"No," the purple mech added quickly, "I mean, the proletarians need an ideal: someone to look up to, someone to follow, someone of their own kind. You know they will not follow you after all the bad publicity you got, but they would surely follow a puppet, if the puppet was a convincing one. In the end, as you set the driving gears turning, the rest will have to click in their respective places sooner or later."

"The ideal…" Megatron repeated in a low growl, much like tasting the very word. Shockwave remained silent, staring at the flashing stripes of white and grey on his disconnected vidscreen, his fuel pump beating in the audio receptors with a deafening loudness. He counted the astroseconds flying by, but there was no answer. After a short while the transmission was cut with a sharp pop, which almost blew the console's speakers.

He stood there for a moment, unable to move, and waited until his clinking finger joints stopped shaking.

ooo

_To be continued…_


End file.
